The DOT's challenge: Some Movers Who Lost Licenses Still Taking Customers

Underscoring the challenges federal officials face in cracking down on moving companies, at least 18 of the nation's companies with complaints lodged against them and whose licenses were revoked for various reasons in the second half of 2022 continued to advertise interstate moves in June, according to a Newsweek review.

Several companies confirmed they had carried out such moves, though some said they had done them through affiliated companies. The Department of Transportation does not list whether licenses were revoked specifically because of the complaints, though some license revocations appear to be because of insurance lapses or safety violations.

DOT officials said revoking licenses is one tactic they would deploy in Operation Protect Your Move, a nationwide crackdown on the movers with the most consumer complaints announced earlier this year. But Newsweek's review underscores that even license revocation may be an ineffective tool to reverse the growing tide of moving company complaints with only limited legal authority. Agency officials have said they require additional authority from Congress.

The DOT's Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration did not specifically say whether continuing to advertise interstate moves after a license is revoked violates departmental rules, saying it would look at each case individually. In a statement, it said the agency is assessing the more than 100 investigations launched during Operation Protect Your Move and its findings will be made public.

"Similar to the expectation that an individual will not operate a motor vehicle if their driver's license is revoked, companies are expected to cease related operations if their authority is revoked," the statement said. "If FMCSA is made aware that a broker or mover continues to operate even after its authority has been revoked by the agency, we may take additional administrative action. FMCSA has no criminal enforcement authority."

Operation Protect Your Move was announced after Connecticut Democrat Sen. Richard Blumenthal called for tougher action against moving company scams in a letter to Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.

Blumenthal's letter was spurred in part by a February Newsweek investigation into the mushrooming problem, including movers who hold customer possessions "hostage" until they are paid exorbitant fees. The letter acknowledged the limitations on the DOT's authority but said it could be more aggressive in referring cases for prosecution to the U.S. Justice Department. Blumenthal did not say whether he would introduce legislation to ramp up the agency's authority.

Under current law, officials at the DOT's Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration have no authority to arrest or fine for moving company violations and have worked with the Justice Department to bring only 13 criminal cases and six civil cases against movers since January 1, 2017. The number of complaints against moving companies more than doubled between 2015 and 2022, from 3,030 to 7,647, including 3,644 alleging a "hostage" situation.

For this article, Newsweek examined 98 companies that were the subject both of a consumer complaint and had their license revoked for various reasons. Eighteen still advertised cross-country moves on their websites in June. Newsweek attempted to contact all the companies, but was only able to interview representatives with six of them.

Reached by phone in May, Kai, who said he was the manager when answering the phone of Pro Smart Movers of Alexandria, Virginia, and did not provide a last name, said the firm has done some interstate moves this year. The company's license was revoked in December 2022 and has been the subject of seven FMCSA complaints.

"It's become more slow than last year," Kai said of the firm's 2023 business.

Evelyn Antonsen knows what it's like to hire a mover that has seen its license revoked. The moving company she used was not among the 98 Newsweek examined, but had its license pulled earlier in 2019.

Fulfilling a lifelong wish to return to her birthplace of Puerto Rico from Washington, D.C., the 75-year-old retired school principal carefully packed only her most precious heirlooms into 31 boxes destined for her new, smaller home in Old San Juan.

The moving company she contacted had a good reputation among Puerto Ricans for years, she said, but it ultimately contracted her move to New Jersey-based Pryco Movers in July 2022, nearly three and a half years after its license was revoked. She is still waiting for the delivery nearly a year later.

Antonsen contacted authorities in Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico, as well as at the FMCSA, which she said forwarded her complaint and others about the company to a New Jersey field office. Attempts to reach Pryco Movers were unsuccessful.

Not willing to wait around, Antonsen traveled to New Jersey in March after a Pryco employee confirmed her boxes were in a warehouse. She intended to have a different company move them out of storage. She called the local police department when she was refused access because, she was told, she needed to make an appointment with management to enter the warehouse. Later, she says, an officer who was permitted to enter found only a jumbled pile of boxes that could not be identified as hers.

Earlier this month, Antonsen said she was notified by the Polk County Sheriff's Office in Lakeland, Florida, which she had contacted because it was also investigating the company, that her case and those of other Pryco customers had been forwarded to the FBI's Tampa field office. A spokeswoman with the office said the FBI does not confirm or deny the existence of an investigation.

Among the heirlooms she has been unable to get back, Antonsen said, is a family recipe book she recently needed to cook her mother's pork shoulder recipe for Mother's Day. There are paintings and other gifts given to her by her family, along with numerous family photos.

"Those are my memories—my physical memories—things I can look at and say, 'this was my mom's or that was my grandson's,'" Antonsen said. "Those items are who I am. They represent me. They represent my family and my grandkids."

Antonsen's story is not unusual, given the thousands of moving company victims each year.

The FMCSA logged 55 complaints against Imperial Freight Lines, including 22 complaints of goods being held hostage, in 2022. The company's license allowed it to serve as a "broker"—meaning an intermediary between a customer and an often-small "carrier" with trucks that performs the move.

Its license was revoked in October 2022, but the Imperial Freight Lines website advertised across state-lines moves when visited in June. It warned that only licensed movers follow strict federal guidelines.

"Don't stress out though, because we here at Imperial Freight Lines have got you covered," the website says. "We can take your important belongings from the East Coast all the way to the West Coast."

Imperial Freight Lines representatives hung up when called for comment on this story. No response was received to emails sent to an address on the company's website. It is not clear whether the company was, in fact, still conducting interstate moves.

Bad brokers have been particularly problematic for customers and the FMCSA. None of the five brokers among the 18 companies still advertising cross-country moves could be reached for comment for this story.

Newsweek's February investigation showed how brokers offer low cost moves in exchange for large, up-front deposits before connecting consumers with carriers that often hold their goods hostage. When bad internet reviews and FMCSA complaints pile up, the firms, which are mostly based in Florida, "reincarnate" as a new company with a new name and president and begin again.

Reached by phone, some of the carrier representatives Newsweek interviewed said their moves were being completed by another company, not the unlicensed one featured on their websites. Federal regulations prohibit a company from conducting a move in the name of another mover.

After contacting Allstate Moving of Kent, Washington, a representative who responded said he was with another, licensed company and did not know how he received Newsweek's inquiry. A message left for the other company with the representative was not returned. Allstate Moving lost its license in July 2022 and 17 complaints have been made with the FMCSA about the company.

Amber Hallaman, co-owner of A&M Friendly Movers of Carolina Shores, North Carolina, confirmed her company does interstate moves, but through a separate company she and her co-owner have a partial ownership interest in. She said A&M operates out of several locations associated with different companies and one of them lost its license because of a lapse in insurance.

"So, unfortunately that happened at that location, but we closed the location," Hallaman said. "We no longer run out of that."

Hallaman said her customers' cross-country moves were now being done through another company that she did not name. No response was received after additional requests for comment. A&M Friendly Movers had been the subject of one FMCSA complaint.

Like A&M, many of the movers' licenses appear to have been revoked after their insurance coverage lapsed, according to FMCSA records. The records do not specify why a license was revoked, but do show that revocations often coincide with insurance lapses, which experts said is a common reason movers lose a license.

At some companies, officials said their revocations were because of motor carrier safety violations such as drivers not getting required rest or failing to have a doctor certification of their fitness to operate trucks. Though the FMCSA cannot fine for moving company violations, it can fine for safety violations.

Manager Carlos Torres of Bay Area Express Moving in San Jose said the company stopped doing moves after it was fined $15,000 for drivers failing to log the time they spent driving. The company's license was revoked in November 2022 because of failing to pay the fine, he said.

"So, basically we're not doing business right now, because as you know the license has been revoked because we didn't pay a fine," Torres said.

Torres said the company continues to take customer calls to schedule future moves because he expects the fine to be paid in the coming weeks. The FMCSA received 12 complaints about Bay Area Express in 2021 and four in 2022. Eight of them alleged hostage situations.

Regal Moving Services of Sterling, Va., has been the subject of only two complaints since 2021, but company president Stanley Burke said it lost its license in November 2022 after two drivers failed to present current medical certifications.

"Really don't do much interstate nowadays," Burke said. "I just focus on local moves."

To conduct local moves within Virginia, companies must be licensed with the state. According to Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles Spokeswoman Ava Adenauer, Regal Moving Services' license to conduct Virginia moves was revoked in January 2020 after its liability insurance was cancelled. Burke did not return additional calls for comment.

Clifford Agnant said he shuttered his company Mid America Movers of Pembroke, Florida, after competition from scam moving companies made it too difficult to operate. Agnant said the firm automatically lost its license when he stopped paying insurance premiums for the company, which had been the subject of six FMCSA complaints. He said the firm's website remains active because it was paid for in advance.

"If anybody wants to call, I just refer them to somebody that still has a license to do their move," Agnant said.

Teresa Murray, director of the consumer watchdog program at the national nonprofit advocacy organization Public Interest Research Group, said that aside from the importance of educating consumers, the biggest impediment to stopping moving scams is a lack of regulation, particularly of moving brokers. She said revoking licenses is unlikely to help.

"Anybody that's going to screw someone with a move, you know, they're not going to care that they're not licensed," Murray said. "It seems like regulators aren't doing enough."

Lawrence Hawthorne, who retired from the FMCSA in 2020 after more than 40 years as an investigator focused primarily on movers, said he believes the industry may now be taking advantage the FMCSA's inability to fine for moving company violations, which it lost in a 2019 arbitration decision.

Hawthorne said brokers were previously not allowed to issue estimates that many have used to lure customers into making large deposits on promises of low-cost moves. Reversing that and restoring the agency's ability to fine could alleviate many scams, Hawthorne said.

"It's just that in today's environment, especially with Congress, it's kind of hard for them to get things done," Hawthorne said, referring to political party divisions. "They need to take care of this situation so that they can go back to issuing fines."

Antsonsen, who hopes to one day get her belongings to Puerto Rico, said she is worried about how her boxes are being treated and whether any items have been damaged. She becomes overwhelmed with emotion as she explains what happened with her move.

She's not just fighting the movers, she said, "I'm fighting the system that's supposed to be helping the consumer."

Matt Clark can be reached at m.clark@newsweek.com or find him on Twitter at @MattTheJourno.